You gotta show up to community engagement meetings people are crazy

The East Bay is really doing an amazing job with this. Emeryville, Oakland, and Berkeley (and probably more cities) are all including safety improvements alongside regular paving in a way that would be unimaginable a couple years ago.

Infrastructure Weak@infrastructureweak.bsky.social · yesterday

I love being in Oakland and encountering a protected bike lane project that I've never heard of, let alone had to fight over for years

I love being in Oakland and encountering a protected bike lane project that I've never heard of, let alone had to fight over for years

Robert Prinz@prinzrob.bsky.social · 3d ago

Indeed this Franklin St road diet & concrete protected bikeway in Downtown Oakland was constructed in a few months w no CEQA, no council approval, no long series of community meetings required. Our bike/walk infra committee reviewed some early designs but that’s it! bsky.app/profile/prin...

We can't solve a housing crisis without building more housing. Today we broke ground on the Casanova Residence, which will soon be nearly 100 affordable and supportive homes with on-site services for New Yorkers. Every new home is a step toward a City that everyone can afford.

I wish we could shake libs out of the consensus position that the progressiveness of a tax policy can be solely evaluated by looking at one side of the ledger I have had many conversations like this “This tax is regressive” >But the revenue is being spent progressively “Had not considered this”

I realize the powers of LA and NYC's mayorship are vastly different, but just having a person like this articulating a vision of what progressive governance actually looks like would be massive for California politics. We need to dream bigger than starting a nonprofit or planning a protest.

Benjamin Schneider@benschneider.bsky.social · 5d ago

Progressive LA Mayoral Candidate Nithya Raman told Vanity Fair that her main difference with DSA is on housing. www.vanityfair.com/story/nithya...

Progressive LA Mayoral Candidate Nithya Raman told Vanity Fair that her main difference with DSA is on housing. www.vanityfair.com/story/nithya...

being an urbanist today is life on easy mode. you just need common sense and some intellectual curiosity about the rest of the world, and the most unhinged illiterate people with obscenely bad vibes will declare themselves your enemies for life, thereby literally doing your job for you

Sam@samd.bsky.social · 6d ago

this guy (doomloop dispatch) literally killed a biker with his car… and he’s posting on twitter how it just made him even more anti-bike lane. The NIMBYs are not OK.

Oakland's Vision 980 freeway reimagining study group is looking for folks to volunteer for their Phase 2 Technical Advisory Committee, If you or anyone you know might be interested, fill out the application form ASAP: forms.cloud.microsoft/Pages/Respon...

Alameda County: meet your candidates Join us in downtown Oakland on Thursday Aug 20th at 6pm for a mixer to meet candidates and elected officials running for office across Alameda County this fall. RSVP required. @seamlessbayareaca.bsky.social

Thank you to @berkeleyca.gov City Council for voting in favor of bike lanes on Hopkins. I’m very glad about this result. Now let’s get it done! ❤️🚲🔋⚡️

Imagine telling Berkeley council members Kesarwani, Taplin, and Lunaparra that they are white gentrifiers...

Theo Gordon@theogordon.bsky.social · last wk.

Move over zucchini lady, this guy calling 'bike lanes white lanes' and calling the Terner Center the 'Gentrification Center' is my new favorite Berkeley Council moment. #berkmtg

Listening to public comment is the best antidote to being stuck in a social media bubble. I think everyone should have to listen to a single discussion of a housing or bike lane proposal at a city council meeting to cleanse the mind of preconceptions of what other people think.

This is one of the acute reasons we must build more housing in San Francisco, and California more broadly. I’d love to live in a country where trans people don’t have to flee their home states for ones with better protections, but we don’t and in the meantime we need to live up to our values here

Liberal Currents@liberalcurrents.com · last wk.

“There has been persecution in the form of increased social scrutiny, harassment and violence. And there has been persecution in the undercutting of access to vital, lifesaving gender-affirming medication despite the overwhelming medical consensus for it.” www.liberalcurrents.com/the-american...

YIMBYs vs our (leftist, somehow?) opponents

Thanks to the work of stalwart local advocates, Oakland DOT is proposing an extension of the Grand Ave protected bikeway thru the Grand Lake District! Read about this, more bikeway updates & upcoming group rides in @bikeeastbay.bsky.social's #LakeMerrittLoop update: bikeeastbay.org/lake-merritt...

If we want to make homeownership more attainable in California, we have to start building condos again. Today, we barely do. Here's why that matters — and why I'm working on reforming California's construction defect laws. 🧵

I just read an apparently serious claim that the Hopkins bike/walk/bus project will “gentrify” that North Berkeley neighborhood. Said neighborhood was developed on a history of racial exclusion, the effects of which are still apparent today.

Bike East Bay@bikeeastbay.bsky.social · 2w ago

North Berkeley's Hopkins protected bikeway debate is coming to a head (again!) with a vote at City Council this Tuesday, July 28. We & our local partners are in support of the council referral, and we encourage you to get involved too! Learn more here: BikeEastBay.org/Hopkins

Forget the fact that they’re opposing housing. Just imagine opposing such a beautiful building, and one that pays such subtle-yet-distinctive homage to the iconic “Marina” Safeway store design.

San Francisco Public Press@sfpublicpress.bsky.social · 2w ago

A proposal to turn San Francisco’s Marina Safeway site into a towering, dense housing project has courted controversy all year, with its district supervisor and neighborhood groups urging the city’s Planning Department to reject the project. www.sfpublicpress.org/controversia...

On the same day she posted this, the LA Metro board (including Bass) awarded $100 million to freeway widening projects.

Mayor Karen Bass@mayor.lacity.gov · 2w ago

As Chair, I’ll build a long-term financial plan to make Metro fare-free. I’ve fought for a world-class transit system my entire career because public transit should create opportunity for everyone.

The SF Planning Commission approved this project yesterday. Here's what the city's planning director had to say about it:

Benjamin Schneider@benschneider.bsky.social · 4w ago

One of the first projects to show the impacts of SF's recent upzoning. 8 stories, 8 units, in a mostly 2-3 story area. sfyimby.com/2026/07/rend...

San Francisco cannot be a refuge for red state queers when a crappy studio costs three thousand dollars a month.

Don’t sleep on this. You must vote Ben Allen for insurance commissioner. FAIR is a disaster now and worse in the future

Mark Sawchuk@snarkmawchuk.bsky.social · 2w ago

Jane Kim, the current front-runner for the state insurance commissioner, would make this already unsustainable problem even worse. She wants you to subsidize fire insurance for rich people who choose to live in the urban-wildland interface where wildfires do the most property damage.

Abundance discourse focuses a lot on Klein's book and meta analysis about centrist pundits, but the biggest practitioner of abundance has been Mamdani for quite some time.

Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani@mayor.nyc.gov · 2w ago

NYC’s small business owners have said it over and over: endless paperwork and uncertainty has made getting their stores up and running too difficult. So we’re cutting red tape, eliminating redundant permits (did you know you need a permit just to serve some ice cream?), and speeding up inspections.

Did this local Half Moon Bay resident opposed to affordable housing for farmworkers somehow miss the 2023 mass shooting in Half Moon Bay by farmworker who snapped over working conditions at a Half Moon Bay farm!?

Jordan Grimes@cafedujord.bsky.social · 2w ago

He is now arguing that there aren’t actually any farms in Half Moon Bay. “Where are the farms?!” Both myself and the former councilmember are dumbstruck.

Anti-YIMBYs use euphemisms like “empowering local voices” and “preserving community input” when they’re defending California’s status quo because they can’t explicitly say “rich homeowners should have the power to block subsidized housing for low income retired farm workers” and be taken seriously.

Jordan Grimes@cafedujord.bsky.social · 2w ago

For the last 4 (!) years, I've been chronicling the journey of a 40 unit 100% affordable housing project for senior farmworkers in Half Moon Bay, California. Despite being approved in May, the journey sadly isn't over: a measure has qualified for the ballot this November to stop the project. 🧵

This is the first time I’ve ever seen a CA publication speak plainly about both the stakes (and the basic distributional politics involved) The FAIR plan is a ticking time bomb and the primary problem is it promises to insure uninsurable property for rich people. www.latimes.com/business/sto...

Californians are subsidizing mansion wildfire insurance as FAIR risk explodes

As commercial insurers have fled California in the wake of wildfires, FAIR has become the insurer of first resort for owners of multimillion-dollar properties in exclusive but fire-prone communities.

latimes.com

Absolutely horrifying. This kind of sick shit (which happens on some level every day in California and beyond) is why advocates push back on the idea that the only housing boogeymen are big corporations. Petty bourgeoisie assholes like these kill by a thousand cuts and it has to end now.

Jordan Grimes@cafedujord.bsky.social · 2w ago

For the last 4 (!) years, I've been chronicling the journey of a 40 unit 100% affordable housing project for senior farmworkers in Half Moon Bay, California. Despite being approved in May, the journey sadly isn't over: a measure has qualified for the ballot this November to stop the project. 🧵

Just to say it, it’s a vast majority of the city in favor of bike lanes, not a small minority. The anti-bike-lane people are the small minority. bsky.app/profile/marc...

Marc Hedlund@marcprecipice.bsky.social · last yr.

Last fall, I was tired of hearing that support for bikes came from a narrow minority of Berkeley, so I commissioned a poll to ask how broad support is here. The answer is that the vast majority of the city, 73%—and even a majority of people who do not bike—support adding more bike infrastructure.